It is common practice in the fruitgrowing industry to train vine and branches to grow across horizontal support wires. In order to maximize the yield of the fruit crop, it is important that the vine or branch be retained in a relatively fixed position with respect to the support wire.
One known fastener for retaining a branch or vine along a support wire is disclosed in copending design patent application Ser. No. 682,138, filed Dec. 17, 1984, which is in the name of Peter K. McCully and assigned to the same assignee as this invention. The fastener disclosed in the aforementioned design application has been found to work successfully for smaller branches. However, it has been found that larger branches tend to slide the fastener along the support wire in the presence of a strong wind or due to the expansion force exerted by the growth of the branch over a period of time.
This invention overcomes the above-noted deficiencies by providing a fastener that has greater gripping forces on the support wire while maintaining substantially the same amount of force required to install and remove the fastener for the support wire.
Another object of this invention is to provide a fastener which is inexpensive to mold from plastic materials and which is easy to install on and remove from a support wire.